Fantomas - this week at Cinematheque

The Chauvel Cinematheque's in-depth, month-long look at the motion picture serial, a forgotten but still reverberating form of motion picture history, kicks off this Monday the 12th of January at 6:30 with an episode of Louis Feuillade's 1913 silent French serial Fantomas.

With an introduction by film historian Barrie Pattison and a new score performed live by the "young Franz Liszt" Adrian Clement, this event promises to be a lot of fun.

Join Australia’s leading film historian Barrie Pattison as he delves into the weird world of motion picture serials in the first of this four part program. Follow the cycle as it moves from its surreal origins with the serials of Louis Feuillade to James Bond, Indiana Jones and the Dark Knight. This program contrasts Feuillade’s archetypal serial drama Fantomas with the Batman serial of the 1940s.

Fantomas France/1914/B&W/60mins/16mm/NFVLS Dir: Louis Feuillade.

A long excerpt from the classic French serial devoted to the exploits of the criminal anti-hero Fantomas. Our detective hero battles the hooded terror of the Paris streets, who brings his own vamp characters and boa constrictors into the fray. Combines a sense of fantasy and lyricism with documentary details of pre WWI France.

Click on the new program link on the right sidebar to find out about the rest of the screenings in this thread.